The latest content update toWarframeis now live, with the Isleweaver expansion continuing to build on 1999’s storyline. Moreover, this newWarframerelease has ushered in a Warframe design that fans of the game have been demanding for some time.
Warframe’s new Isleweaver expansionadds a great deal, which is an impressive feat considering its closeness to Techrot Encore. Continuing the 1999 storyline, Isleweaver brings in some new quality-of-life improvements, including increased loadout slots and enhancements to Slam attacks, as well as a helping of wholly new features. Players have new story content to follow on Scholar’s Landing, as well as new augments and a new weapon.
Warframe Finally Adds A Spider-Themed Playable Character with Warframe
Thespider-themed Warframe Oraxiais the latest to join the game’s playable cast, and its inclusion was no small feat. With fans spending years clamoring for an arachnid Warframe, it’s no surprise that those at Digital Extremes have been toying with the idea for a similar length of time. Game Rant sat down with principal artist Nikita Leshakov and lead animator Jay Baker, both of whom spoke about the creation of Oraxia, including her conceptualization and the challenges that arose from her spider-like design.
Oraxia’s Concepts
When it came toadding Oraxia toWarframe, the process was longer than average. Leshakov spoke about just how long the team has been batting around the idea of a spider-themed Warframe, and how that conceptualizing eventually resulted in Oraxia.
“Longer than I’ve worked here. The team tried it once with Khora, but that design ended up pivoting a lot to something new. It is definitely a very popular archetype in media.
As for Oraxia specifically, ideation started in January 2023. One of the reasons it took so long to make since then was that we kind of had to let the game’s story develop to a point where there was a narrative place for a spider-themed Warframe. That’s always important to us. Also, I wasn’t happy with my earlier designs, so I’m glad it took that long.”
In terms of those designs, the prelude toOraxia’s inclusion inWarframe’s Isleweaver update, Leshakov had more to say. Leshakov added that “There was one design that did look like finished concept art, and I wasn’t really all that proud of it, which was the main reason it got scrapped,” as well as “I think the design process for this one was rather chaotic. Since I was responsible for both the concept and the final model, the actual ‘concept art’ for Oraxia never materialized—at some point, I just started designing as I was sculpting.”
Animating Oraxia
Oraxia went through a few growing pains, withthe team behindWarframeclearly trying to adequately answer fan demand. With a concept decided upon, though, the next challenges came with bringing that design to life. Baker spoke more on this subject, specifically about Oraxia’s multiple arachnid limbs—an aspect key to the spider-like quality in her design.
“The major challenge with Oraxia was definitely the addition of the appendages; it’s the only Warframe with a unique moveset that required us to layer existing weapon grip sets on top. We divided the body into two channels, the upper and lower body, using an animation mask. The lower hip bone downwards was responsible for Oraxia’s legs as well as the spider legs, while the upper hip bone upwards was used to play our existing weapon grip arrays. Unfortunately, it wasn’t as simple as that; the variation in hip and spine orientation between the plethora of grips and states (normal, hipfire, aiming) introduced unwanted aim pose offsets. We corrected this by limiting the upper body to idle sets and creating custom hip orientation for the remaining culprits.”
